It’s got a tone problem. As in whipsawing from believable to farce so two-dimensional you want to shut the damn program down.

But Jean Smart is so GOOD!

How did we get here? Replicating the old TV model with the new?

In case you’ve been under a rock, it appears that all streaming video outlets are now going to have free or discounted advertising tiers.

So what exactly is different about today’s paradigm from that of yesteryear, the one that has dominated for decades?

On demand. You can watch what you want when you want.

Only you can’t. You’re at the mercy of the outlets dripping out episodes to “build buzz” and to keep you from canceling. What of this reminds you of the modern world? NOTHING!

I mean we already have HBO. And Showtime and Starz and…

If you pay for them, you can watch them live on the flat screen, or on demand via your cable system, or via an app.

Arguably, the average customer is going to pay just as much and end up with less. I mean at least if you paid for the cable bundle you got network, with its local news, and scores of basic cable channels which will disappear without the cable system subsidy/payment. This is progress, ending up with less?

As for the bump in product…expect that to taper off as the players are solidified. Same as it ever was. Or meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Talking Heads or the Who, whichever you prefer, or both. Then again, they ruled in an era where many music fans didn’t even have a TV, or if they did didn’t turn it on. Today all the action is on the flat screen. As for the live show…I know people want to go, but the experience is different, it used to be exclusive, you had to go to know, now they’re just mass gatherings of people who want to shoot photos and say they were there.

So it all comes down to “House of Cards.” The first original Netflix series, which was better than anything else being televised. It drew fans, caused word of mouth, added subscriptions.

And in truth HOC took a couple of years to have complete traction. Just like the “Sopranos.” There’s so much in the channel, it’s hard to gain notice. So if you’re dripping out new shows week by week you’re actually losing instead of winning. Most people don’t know and don’t care, word of mouth on everything but hard news (well, soft news occasionally too), takes eons to spread. The best example here being “Breaking Bad,” which was on AMC for seasons but didn’t burgeon until people could binge it on Netflix. Binge, that’s the appropriate word. I mean come on, your mother buys half a gallon of ice cream and she tells you you can only have two spoonfuls a day. What! You know as well as I do that when it comes to ice cream and potato chips they truly only satisfy when you can eat them to excess. When you’re the one making the decision, when you’re the only one establishing limits, if any at all. I must say one of the things in life I enjoy most is sitting in the dark watching streaming television, being taken away. This is wholly different from reality/game shows, this is about narrative, a whole world, and when the mood is broken because I run out of episodes I’m pissed!

So the “backward” music business figured this out. You can get all the music for one low monthly price. And Spotify has a free tier, but that’s to combat piracy. Piracy is less of an issue in visual entertainment, if for no other reason than the files are bigger. But if you release all the episodes at once…it’s easier to just pay up than steal. Which is the Spotify game. Remember when all the insiders said no one would ever pay for music? What a laugh that turned out to be.

So the whole agency side of “Hacks” sucks. I literally turned off the first episode, it was too long a jump from the drama I’d been watching. But when Jean Smart does her thing…

You’re never quite sure exactly what she’s going to say.

Ever been around rich or famous people (or both?). There’s an inherent pecking order, even if each individual is paying their own freight, the rich/famous person dominates, is in charge, even if they say nothing! You play by their rules. You don’t go against them. Which is why you always hear about these same people being out of touch because they’re surrounded by yes people.

So, Jean Smart as Deborah Vance is the rich and famous person here. Her star may have faded, but she still drives that Rolls Royce with the suicide doors. Yes, if you’re rich and famous you’ve got to act the part, you’ve got to live in the right place, drive the latest car and tip well at the best establishments. It’s your image! Especially if you’re an oldster.

So everybody’s afraid of her. But you never know when she’ll step down from her pedestal to your level and speak the truth. When she’s in the aforementioned electric blue Rolls and tells Hannah Einbinder/Ava the score, when she zeroes in on Ava’s personality, WHEW!

You’d be surprised how many rich and famous people are smart, at least street smart, because it’s a long way to the top, no matter how much you wanna rock and roll. You’re privy to all the lessons the public never sees, what happens on the other side of the curtain, the business. And believe me, it’s cutthroat.

As for Hannah Einbinder/Ava, she’s noticeably better this year. Because she’s grown into the role. She’s actually aged a bit, which makes her more believable. The fact that she was a writer with experience in the previous season? I didn’t buy it.

But even Hannah/Ava slips into two-dimensionality. When she’s constantly worried about that e-mail surfacing. I wish the broad comedy were excised, there’s enough real material without all the tropes, the gay assistant, the agency underling who has the hots for Jimmy who is played so broadly that you wince every time she talks, not at her so much as at the writers, what were they thinking, that we were going to buy this?

And in the second episode there’s a scene with Polly Draper.

You’ll recognize her, it may take a while for you to place her, she was Ellyn Warren on “thirtysomething.” But that was over thirty five years ago, and Polly Draper is 66 AND HAS HAD NO PLASTIC SURGERY!

Movie stars do not age, and at this point neither do musicians. Not only women, but men. Speaking of which, when you see Wayne Newton in this show you’re only reminded of one thing, that “Twilight Zone” episode “In the Eye of the Beholder,” you know, the one with the doctors and nurses with the faces? Newton is the greatest advertisement for stopping plastic surgery extant. Other than the cat lady. But at this point Newton is just as bad. But Draper?

Draper looks like a real person. Much better-looking than the average person, but she’s believable.

As for Jean Smart…she’s got lines in her face too.

As do I. It goes with the territory. You can keep telling yourself you have the mind and skin of a thirty year old, but inside your body knows different. Nobody here gets out alive and when we see people acting years younger than their age, we wince.

So what you’ve got here is an adult comedy. Except when it’s at the level of a cartoon, the kind of stuff a five or six year old would appreciate. Shows can grow over time, can’t this show be adjusted?

Well, it’s too late now, I’m sure all the episodes are in the can. But these shows have a long lead time, when you see them they’re already planning the following season.

So will what I wrote above get you to watch “Hacks”?

Not the second season. Either you’re a fan or you’re not. Either you watched the first season or you didn’t. If you did, you give the first two episodes of the second season the benefit of the doubt. But if you start there…you’re probably not gonna get it. But you could binge the first season and get it completely. That’s what happened with “Breaking Bad”!

How did we get here?

If you don’t give the people what they want in tech, you’re superseded. You have to be constantly innovating or you’re left behind. Although oldsters haven’t stopped bitching, one thing is for sure, the music industry has cut ties with the past. Sure, labels may still be focused on terrestrial radio, but the public isn’t. Hell, the public moved to TikTok and now the labels have too.

But in TV?

The suits think they’re still in control. That it can go their way.

And to see how Netflix has reacted to Wall Street’s reaction to their numbers…makes me want to puke.

Let me see… You had a business plan, you believed in it, but Wall Street soured on you and you listened to investors? This is like sports teams turning over the coaching to the fans. Sure, they foot the bill, but they’re not professionals, they’re not in the locker room, it’s all surface, and of the moment. They want it all and they want it now, and that’s no way to run a business.

People want the content that bad, but the minute they have an option… This is what happened with Napster, the industry was cruising on overpriced CDs and then…

We’re sick of the gatekeepers telling us how to consume our content. We want to be in control. Isn’t that the message of the online world, have it your way?

But not in the TV world, because these people think they’re better than us.

But after two plus decades online we know that is patently untrue. They’re delusional.

I’m frustrated. And like John Lennon sang, I’m not the only one.

Happy that you read the book and that you mentioned my name. But that’s not really necessary or encouraged.  A good press agent cedes the spotlight to the client who, in this case, is author Mitchell Cohen.  His name wasn’t mentioned in your piece so that’s what I’m doing now.  He is also the editor of and one of the primary contributors to The White Label Promo Preservation Society: 100 Flop Albums You Ought to Know

(https://www.amazon.com/White-Label-Promo-Preservation-Society/dp/1735998516).

That book is noteworthy to me insofar as quite a few of my friends/clients/family participated serendipitously (meaning I have nothing to do with it) including Arthur Levy, Gregg Geller, Tammy Faye Starlite. Keith Hartel, Joe McEwen, Tom Vickers, Ben Merlis. David Fricke, Lenny Kaye, Ira Robbins, Marshall Crenshaw, Billy Altman, Dave DiMartino, Susan Whitall, Jeff Tamarkin, Russ Titelman, Jim Farber and maybe some others that have slipped my mind.

At any rate, as they promo guys used to say, “thanks for the spins.”

Best,

Bob Merlis

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Thanks for giving Steve Backer some much deserved love. I look forward to reading this. He was a music man, a record guy who loved his art-in his case- jazz. Arista Freedom much like Steve’s output at Impulse! Records veered toward the avant-garde, making it an even more curious association. Steve cared about the art form, the music and the artists. A really decent human being, who I was privileged to call mentor and friend.

-Ricky Schultz

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Steve Backer made so many great jazz records with full investment from the major labels— first for Impulse and then Arista. I remember his visits to the New England Music City store that I managed in Boston, excited that he had made a deal to license Sun Ra records from the musician’s El Saturn label, or that he had signed Anthony Braxton. He was a true inspiration who showed me that record labels could be convinced to fund great music, at least when no one was paying all that much attention. Seriously, the idea that you could make records for a modest budget and at least break even on them was once a part of record label consciousness, and many wonderful records were made that way.

Scott Billington

___________________________________

I met Jerry Mangalos back in the mid-2000’s. It was at the Cat Club on Sunset. We played there and went the following night when the Starfuckers were playing (Slim Jim wasn’t there tho…).  We hung out back where the smokers were.

He had some interesting tales about Clive and the whole Milli Vanilli thing.  He invited us to a party at Phil Spector’s house when Mr. Spector was out on parole. My artist at the time declined saying he didn’t want to get shot too…  Kinda wish we’d have went.

ajawam2

___________________________________

Thank you for this recommendation. I just pre-ordered. Larry Uttal was my boss at Private Stock. What a dear man !

Kathy Rowe

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Having worked directly with Larry Uttal at Private Stock Records from ‘75-‘77, I can attest to the shear genius and humanity of the man. Larry placed a value and faith on the people around him (many times to his detriment).
He also enabled us to speak our true opinions when he legitimately didn’t not the course to take in buying a master or signing an act. “Tell me what you really think. Faint heart never won fair maiden, Louis”.
He actually took my opinion and bought a $5k master after I back my word with the promise that he could take whatever he didn’t make back out of my salary.
“Now you’ve skin in the game, Louis. I’m going to buy you that master.”  Oh shit, what have I done?  No worries.  It was “A Fifth of Beethoven” by Walter Murphy.
Special note here, Larry Uttal (along with Neil Bogart), deserve to be in The Rock &Roll Hall of Fame. Larry Uttal put 45s on almost every turntable in America and should be recognized for that.

Thank for recognizing a true music business innovator.

Louis Lewow
Johns Creek, GA.

___________________________________

All valid commentary on Larry/Bell and Clive/Arista. I would just like to shed some light on David Forman. Yep, his solo album had some hefty hype (he is a great singer) and he went on to form a popular Neo-Do Wop group called Little Isidore and The Inquisitors but the point here is to talk about where I see David these days. With film and television being one of the few music business islands remaining above water and keeping musicians working, I find myself laying down drum tracks for period piece Netflix or HBO type series more and more. If there is music from the 50s through the 70s, David Forman is usually sitting in the control room off to the side of the console as a consultant to the Music Supervisor. David is the go-to pro who informs either the supervisor or the engineer bits like, “tempo is too fast,” “guitar sound is too distorted,” “more reverb on the Spector era horns” or, “the top harmony would not be a Bb minor.” He is a pop music historian and heavily relied on here in New York to keep the music honest. On a somewhat recent session for Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, I hung out after finishing my drum tracks to watch David chime in on period correctness with regard to a Wall of Sound rhythm section, complete with a horn and string type sonic landscape. It’s always an education to witness.

Rich Pagano

___________________________________

I have my own little history with Clive. After making Batdorf and Rodney records with Ahmet Ertegun and David Geffen, this was a whole new experience. Ahmet and David nurtured songwriter/artists and tried to build their careers and then we signed with Arista. We were one of the early signings for Arista and Clive loved us but there was a catch, he was more interested in hits and after Manilow’s success with Mandy, he thought he had the gift of finding hits for acts that were written by other songwriters. His deal was the band gets 8 and I get 2 and so it was. After our history as an FM act, Clive wanted us to break out with an AM hit single. He made us record You Are A Song and Gentler Time,  both written by Jim Weatherly. We didn’t really like them but that was the deal but they were not hits for us. About a year later, he rushed us into the studio to record Somewhere In The Night which was released as a single in the fall of 1975. It started out great entering the charts at #80 but Helen Reddy released her version and they both cancelled each other’s out and Barry eventually got the hit. Soon after, Mark and I split up and I formed Silver. He made us record a song we all hated, Wham Bam Shang-a-Lang which we all hated but it became a hit single that made it to #16 nationally. We dreaded singing it every night on the road as our “big hit”. Ironically, in 2017, the record was picked as one of the songs for the Guardians Of The Galaxy ll movie which got us over 10 million plays on Youtube and made the band some money. So, as much as I didn’t love his formula, he did hit magic twice with that one.

John Batdorf

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I’m really happy you wrote about this, and I can’t wait to read it. Did I miss something, or did you not mention that the book was written by Mitchell Cohen? As you may know, Mitchell started his career as a critic at publications like Film Comment and Creem, and then shifted into A&R and had a long and very successful run at Arista, Columbia, and finally, Verve. He’s a brilliant guy and one of the kindest and best people I know. Also: people may be interested to know that it’s the first book to be published by Trouser Press Books, a new indie imprint run by Ira Robbins, founder and publisher of the late, great, and highly-influential Trouser Press Magazine.

Wishing you all the best,

Regina Joskow

Rounder Records

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Thanks!  Happy you enjoyed and shared the read!

Mitchell Cohen did his homework!  “Looking for the Magic:  New York City, the ’70s and the Rise of Arista Records”, is so well written and researched!  How do I know?

I was at Bell in the early ’60s, back in ’74 when a friend asked for a favor. The favor,  assist Clive Davis at Bell for two weeks as  she was going with Larry to Private Stock.  So, I said yes because I just left RSO and wanted to hang, but since it was ONLY for two weeks!  It was a yes!  26 years later, 2000, I retired from Arista!

To reiterate, Mitchell did his homework and wrote this wonerful book with love, passion,  knowledge and respect!  I do recommend if you were around!  You’ll enjoy the read!

Thanks Bob!

Rose Gross-Marino

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Oh, Mitchell Cohen! Say no more. He knows his stuff. I will read this. Thanks Bob.

Richard Pachter

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Friends have been texting me about your piece on my Arista book, and I want to thank you for picking it up and sticking with it. The Bell and Jazz parts were so much fun to research and write, because those are relatively “untold” stories. I call this book an Arista Records “remix”: bringing up things that were always there, but overwhelmed by other more prominent elements.
With much appreciation,

Mitchell Cohen

“Looking for the Magic: New York City, the ’70s and the Rise of Arista Records”: https://amzn.to/3woKdBs

1

I wasn’t interested. Another testimonial to self-aggrandizing Clive Davis.

But that’s not what it is.

Bob Merlis sent the hype and at first I ignored it, but then I said “what the hell” and asked him to send a copy. Got to say Merlis doesn’t bug me if I don’t write about what he sends, but I don’t want him to send that which I’ll never partake of, and Felice is constantly complaining about the overflowing towers of books in the garage. I tell her it’s a garage! As long as she can get the car in… Most of these books will never see print again, they will be forgotten. But I have them.

So I opened the paperback when it came, and was stunned to find out it’s not about the Arista Records everybody talks about, the house that Whitney built, but what happened before. The book ENDS with the first Whitney Houston album. What came before?

Larry Uttal. Bell Records. That’s the best part of the book, the delineation of the trials and tribulations of an indie label back in the sixties. You see the record business hadn’t been formalized, it wasn’t mature, it was still being figured out. And don’t forget, in the mid to late sixties the business completely flipped, from singles to albums. And then came consolidation. Which wasn’t really complete…well, until very recently. There are only four producers of baby formula? Well there are only three major labels. And I’d say that’s heinous, and it is on one level, primarily that they own their catalogs of the greatest music in history, essentially all the music in recorded history, and they wield undue power as a result, but the truth is the barrier to entry is nearly nonexistent. And…

I was thinking about how technology changed the business. In the sixties it was FM radio. Eighties MTV. Today?

Don’t think the internet hasn’t changed the sound we hear. Hip-hop is dominant on the hit parade because it embraced the internet. I know I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again, one of the reasons rock is dying is because the bands keep labeling Spotify and streaming the devil. Which is like bitching about electric cars, after they dominate, which they will. You can’t fight lost battles. Not that the artists know what battle they are fighting. Do they really want to go back to the pre-internet era, when most acts couldn’t get a deal, when the barrier to entry, to making a record and getting it distributed, was so high? I don’t think so, but…

Ultimately we’re in a fertile era. And it’s about software as opposed to hardware. I.e. the music as opposed to distribution. Then again, we now have TikTok crossover stars. Which is good, it takes the power away from the major labels. The majors don’t control TikTok, they have so much less power over ByteDance’s platform than they do Spotify, Apple, Amazon, Deezer, Tidal…although too many acts jump into the majors’ hands after establishing a beachhead. I’m going to tell you what you should already know. The label doesn’t care about you, not whatsoever, it only cares about itself. And when you’re done producing revenue you’re kicked to the curb, so you’d better be prepared, even better don’t take the major label bait, unless you can write the deal on your terms.

But that’s today. We’re in the midst of change.

Like we were in the sixties.

2

So Larry Uttal had a unique philosophy, rather than employ A&R people (I should say men, that’s reinforced in the book, how all the label employees were men), Uttal made deals with producers, and then did his best to blow up the records they delivered. And he worked with names and they produced hits and if you lived through the era you know them all. But it is a bygone era. Akin to the first twenty years of the internet, if that, when it was all about renegade individuals, when the landscape was still fluid, before the ascension of the FAANG companies…Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Google. You don’t want to play anywhere near their lane, because you’re going to hit a roadblock…they’ll either compete with you or buy you, and it will be on their terms.

In other words, the sixties was the era of independents. And that era faded out over the ensuing decades, there was a renaissance in the indie rock world in the nineties, but Nirvana signed to a major and…

There used to be independent distribution. Young ‘uns have got no idea of that, just like they’ve got no idea of a dial phone. The fact that you were dependent upon regional outfits to sell your records… Branch ruled starting in the early seventies, when WEA was formed, and at the end of the decade, even A&M went branch, with RCA, and then Arista followed in the eighties. The business was on the road to consolidation.

Then again, there was a ton of dough being generated, more than ever before. But really the business remained the same, you threw it up against the wall and saw if it stuck, and usually it didn’t.

Most of Arista’s albums didn’t make it. Not that any other label was much better. It was one stiff after another, you couldn’t truly predict what would hit, at least not on a regular basis. The press still had power, but even positive reviews couldn’t push an act over the line, otherwise Willie Nile would be a household name. I bought that album, based on the hype.

But times were changing, Bell couldn’t conquer the albums market, Clive Davis got fired by CBS, and ultimately Columbia Pictures, which had acquired Bell, replaced Uttal with Davis, not that Uttal was done, he formed Private Stock and signed Blondie and… If you have more than one hit, you know how to do it, the faces change but the business remains the same. Although most people never ever have a hit, on either side of the fence, artistic or business. If you make it and sustain you’re somebody in the music business, and there aren’t that many somebodies. You may have dreams, you may make it to the big top for a short while… Staying in? Uber-difficult. As a matter of fact, almost everybody in this book is done, then again, some of them are dead, and all of them are old.

3

So Clive takes over Bell, renames it Arista, signs Patti Smith, but…when Columbia Pictures ultimately unloads the label to Ariola in ’79, the movie company says it’s a wash, the debts were just that high, Clive Davis was never known for making money, he always spent, and if any came in he’d blow it on parties and other image promotion, not only of the acts, but himself too. That’s Clive’s greatest production, his greatest artist development, himself. Then again, he won’t be remembered. But how many of the lightweight Milli Vanilli, Ace of Base songs will either? Larry Uttal’s sixties Bell output supersedes that of Clive, but no one has a sense of history.

That’s plain wrong. Those who grew up when music blew up are into this stuff. Ergo this book. Published by the Trouser Press, whose magazine we all got back in the day. And if you didn’t, you probably won’t find this book interesting.

It’s deep history.

So Arista was New York-centric. It signed New York acts. And when it ventured out to the coast, signing the Pop, which I also bought, it failed. Arista had three towers…pop, rock and jazz. Pop was Barry Manilow, Melissa Manchester and Dionne Warwick. Rock was Patti Smith, Lou Reed, the Outlaws and the Grateful Dead, and jazz…that’s the most interesting story in the book.

All the credit goes to Steve Backer. I knew Backer, he unfortunately passed in 2014, I don’t know if this is a rewrite of history, but he is credited here with forming and running the jazz operation (along with Michael Cuscuna), which was first class when most of the other stuff on the label was not. This was old school record business… Don’t try for a hit, make the albums on a budget, knowing how many they would sell to the ready, eager audience. This business has been completely superseded by the hits business, but this was the essence of the record business way back when. And then it evolved into the throw it against the wall paradigm, and now it’s about winnowing chances, choosing priorities and promoting the hell out of them. So your odds of getting lucky if you’re not one of those priorities? Close to nil.

So if you were around back then you’ll know almost every name in the book. Because we used to know everybody and everything, when the business was still small enough to achieve that. Today a record goes to number one and you’ve never heard of it, never mind heard it. The trades focus on employees you don’t know and don’t need to. Touring has replaced the labels as the driver of the business. That’s where the money is. The promoters are the banks the labels used to be.

I mean this was a long time ago. Nearly fifty years! Clive Davis himself is ninety, and if it weren’t for his Grammy party, his name would never be mentioned. As it is, he has no power, but few ninety year olds do.

4

So should you read this book?

It’s really well-written and really good. I don’t understand the economics whatsoever, it’s a labor of love. If the advance broke into five figures, it wasn’t by much. And what is the market for this book, who wants to know this information?

Certainly not youngsters. It’s all these aged city denizens…David Forman (another album I bought on the hype), does anybody care about him today? Not even those who were aware back then care. And maybe not even Eric Carmen, who created one of Arista’s first hits.

You see at first Arista was cool and hip. You wanted to go with a boutique run by a professional with a track record. But then Lou Reed went back to RCA, word got out that Clive wanted to mess with your music, tell you what to record, pick singles, and then he had his big breakthrough with Whitney and nobody with any credibility or who wanted credibility would sign with Arista, it ended up all pop all the time, and the word on pop used to be there were no legs, it didn’t last.

But today nothing lasts. Everything’s momentary.

So what I’m going to say is I decided to read a bit to tell Merlis I had, if he asked, but then I got hooked, I went down the rabbit hole, this was my life, there’s a good chance it was your life too. Addicted to the radio and the record store, looking for more information. And this book provides it, closes some loops you always wondered about and puts it all in order.

And illustrates that if you think these labels and their employees know what they are doing, you’re wrong.

I mean there are skilled marketing and promotion people, mostly the latter, but the landscape keeps changing, the type of music that hits and how it’s promoted, and the label has to adjust, by the seat of its pants. From the outside it all looks linear. Inside, it’s akin to chaos.

So this book goes deep into the New York scene. Not the Seymour Stein scene, not the alternative scene, but New York nonetheless. Seymour was on the cutting edge, he found what needed to be exposed and then did. He took chances. Society benefited. Clive’s skill was ultimately A&R, the old school way, matching songs to acts, in an era where any act worth its salt only wanted to do its own material, and the material it chose. Clive had the pop world to himself. It wasn’t cool. But then Donnie Ienner left Arista, promoted Mariah Carey at Columbia and pop was everything. Still is, well, it’s the scraps left over from hip-hop, and sometimes the two merge. But back in the sixties and seventies it was about surprising us. The acts weren’t me-too, in many cases they were sui generis. And if you wanted to know which way the wind blew, you listened to a record.

You’ll feel the breeze reading “Looking for the Magic.” You know if you want it, and if you do you won’t be disappointed.

Tune in today, May 17th, to Volume 106, 7 PM East, 4 PM West.

Phone #: 844-6-VOLUME, 844-686-5863

Twitter: @lefsetz or @siriusxmvolume/#lefsetzlive

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